Books like The Shining Skull by Kate Ellis

Private detective Cordelia Gray protects fading star Clarissa Lisle on the island of Courcy, where poisoned letters and Shakespearean riddles threaten a planned cinematic comeback.

Priestess Pyrre Lakatur must kill a list of ten targets—including the one she loves—within ten days to prove fidelity to the God of Death and avoid being given to the deity herself.

A hilarious journey across Ireland, all from the comfort of your seat.

When a regional news item pulls two former police officers back into a deadly case, a burning home and a missing child force detective Gary Goodhew to untangle lies, murder, and hidden motives that threaten everything they thought they had left behind.

Barnaby Grimes races through a Dickensian city, juggling errands and rooftop adventures—until a mysterious parcel from a foggy docked ship lands him at a local school that is suddenly overrun by a dark curse.

Private investigator Heredia is drawn into a chilling murder case when the brother of a former political prisoner is killed in Santiago, stirring a conspiracy that still echoes from Pinochet’s reign.

"Secret societies have fundamentally shaped America's cultural and political landscapes. In ways that are expected but never explicit, the bonds made and lessons learned through the most elite of secret societies have helped make their members senators, governors, ambassadors, CIA directors, Supreme Court justices, and even presidents. At the apex of these institutions stands Yale University and its ancient six secret societies, with their modern--and even more private--"underground" rivals. Tracing a history that has intrigued and enthralled for centuries, winning the attention of such writers as Ernest Hemingway, William Faulkner and F. Scott Fitzgerald, Skulls and Keys recounts the founding and growth of Yale's storied societies as they set the courses for self-education, ambition, and assimilation that have served to define our modern age."--Jacket flap.

FBI Special Agent Emmy Dockery’s razor‑sharp investigative instincts are tested when a nationwide string of seemingly accidental deaths baffles her and puts her ally, Harrison "Books" Bookman, on suspicions.

When Bayport’s new reservoir mysteriously dries up, the Hardy boys investigate a vanished scientist, an ancient river, and a ruthless gang on Skull Mountain – uncovering clues that save the town’s water supply.

A dark, brooding, murderous tale from the Golden Age of Crime

A parent's worst nightmare is Grace's deadliest case...Kipp Brown, successful businessman and compulsive gambler, is having the worst run of luck of his life. He's beginning to lose big style. However, taking his teenage son, Mungo, to their club's big Saturday afternoon football match should have given him a welcome respite, if only for a few hours. But it' at the stadium where his nightmare begins.Within minutes of arriving at the game, Kipp bumps into a client. He takes his eye of Mungo for a few moments, and in that time, the boy is gone. Then he gets the terrifying message that someone has his child, and to get him back alive, Kipp will have to pay. Defying instruction not to contact the police, Kipp reluctantly does just that, and Detective Superintendent Roy Grace is brought into investigate. At first it seems a straightforward case of kidnap. But rapidly Grace finds himself entering a dark, criminal underbelly of the city, where the rules are different and nothing is what it seems...

Detective Inspector Adam Fawley races against time to find eight‑year‑old Daisy Mason after she disappears from her Oxford family home during a costume party, suspecting that the culprit may be someone close to the family.